


return

by Darth Occlus (NotSummer)



Series: divergance (complete) [9]
Category: Star Wars Legends: The Old Republic, Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: Angst, Background Relationships, Crossover, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Hopeful Ending, Introspection, Jedi, Jedi Temple, Moving On, Post-Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith, Tython
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-22
Updated: 2018-03-22
Packaged: 2019-04-06 07:46:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,841
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14052267
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NotSummer/pseuds/Darth%20Occlus
Summary: Her footsteps crunched over the snow as she walked through the long abandoned village. She has left her family behind for this one last journey. She has drifted through stars to here, to this one planet, nestled in the core. It hung heavy in vacuum, and Miyala grew solemn as she landed her ship in the center of some ruins that had once been a village.---After the Order ends, a Jedi returns to the beginning.





	return

Her footsteps crunched over the snow as she walked through the long abandoned village. She has left her family behind for this one last journey. She has drifted through stars to here, to this one planet, nestled in the core. It hung heavy in vacuum, and Miyala grew solemn as she landed her ship in the center of some ruins that had once been a village.

The air was thin here in a way that could not be blamed on the mountains, and Miyala pulled her coat tighter around her. She brushed snow off her lekku as they twitched angrily, and she ducked into a building. Moss and ice and plants and flowers had grown around and within it, and the walls were barely visible as such. There was very little roof left, but it was something.

If her records were correct, she stood in the house of the Matriarch of Kalikori village. She was not psychometric, but with every step, a vision flickered into her mind. She could see a young Chiss Jedi, a vivid girl full of promises and warm laughter. In the next step, she saw an Empire, relentlessly marching against this village and the--- the Temple.

She didn’t take another step. She stopped, and dropped her head into her hands, because she’s seen the footage, and she’s been on the run for two years with her family, with her husband and her brother and his husband, but it hasn’t sunk in, not yet.  _ I’ll grieve when I’m dead _ , she thought viciously, but the old adage came back,  _ there is no death, there is the Force _ .

She took a deep breath and another step.

Another vision awaited, but this time it’s not a memory. It was her, and perhaps she should not have been be so surprised: Tython was a wellspring of the Force and it held many mysteries. She saw herself in the Guardian leaping towards a Sith Warrior, all fierce defiance, a woman taking back her home. 

Miyala scoffed mentally: she belonged in the shadows, not on the front lines. And yet: there was something to the ease with which the woman rallied the trio of Jedi behind her, turning them into an army as she slammed into Sith forces, scattering them with the strength of her blade. She grasped her lightpikes in her hands, squeezing the metal shafts. Another life, perhaps.

She twisted her head around, studying the building. She ran a hand over one of the walls, her fingertips brushing against a viney plant. As her fingers touched it, the leaves turned red, the same red as her fingers, and her eyes widened. The plant hummed in the Force, and she hummed back. Its leaves waved at her in the breezeless afternoon and she shivered. This world was alive in a way others weren’t.

It’s wildness reminded her of Felucia, but it lacked the hungry edge. It lacked the seething gluttony of the carnivorous plants and overgrown wildlife. There was a hunger to this planet, but it existed… elsewhere. She took a step back, and stepped outside the ruined building. She took a deep breath, the frost air burning her throat slightly. She was not meant for the cold: few Twi’leks were. Her people were born of the desert, not snow capped peaks. And yet a whole village had existed here.

Her boots shoved snow aside as she trudged towards a central platform. In the middle of the village. The mortar had worn from the stones, but she knelt, and she could sense a hundred Festivals of Awakening that had happened here. The heart of the village lie beneath her feet, and she leaned forward, landing on knees too young to be hurting so much. She bowed her head, paying her respects, and then she stood, shaking her shoulders to rid herself of snow and old memories.

She wove through trees and bushes as she made her way down to the valley. With each step, her chest constricted, and she fought for her breath as the air grew thicker. The ground was hard beneath her feet, and she stumbled down as loose rock shifted beneath her feet. This had once been a path where dozens had tread for hundreds of years. She rounded a bend, and her breath caught.

The Temple.

If it had been painted once, with banners and proud Jedi markings, they were long gone. But the Temple stood. Her feet picked up speed until she was running, skidding to a halt at the remains of an ancient bridge. She looked down, and she could see animals of a dozen colors splashing within the crystal clear waters. None of them were very big, and the Force whispered nothing but welcome, so she made her way down to the bank, her boots squelching in the mud before she stepped into the water. The river came up to her chest, and she scowled as the spectre of her height laughed at her.

She shook herself in vain as she stood on the opposite side, and she pulled her pants and boots off. Her robes were long enough to cover her upper thighs, and if they weren’t, she was the only person around for miles. It was a small price to pay. She made her way to cobbled steps that led her along a raised path to a circular platform. She stood, stock still. Her bones reverberated in tune with the Temple.

Finally, she began to walk again, until she knelt before the great, closed, stone doors. She pressed her forehead against them.

_ Hello _ , the Temple whispered.

_ I’m here, _ she replied.

_ Where are my children? Where are the Jedi? They walked away, and I have grown old without them. _

Miyala shook.  _ They’re gone. They’re all gone. I know of three other, but we are all in exile. _

_ If you are in exile, why come here? _

_ I needed answers. I thought... I thought I could find them here. _

The doors remained closed, and Miyala waited. Finally, the Temple spoke. Its voice was the voice of a thousand generations of Councils and Masters and Knights and Padawans.  _ What is the question? _

Miyala laughed, and then shook her head. She didn’t kriffing know. What a Jedi thing to ask, anyway: how many times had she heard the same platitude from Master Distombe?  _ I don’t know, Temple. I was just hoping for something. A way to defeat the Empire, maybe. Knowledge. Wisdom. _

_ Are you a Jedi then? _

_ Of course I am, _ she said, but she faltered.  _ I think I am. I was a Jedi Shadow. Before the Empire. _

_ What are you now? _ She had no answer, and the Temple rebuked her, gently,  _ Go and think until you know. _

_ But how do I know if I’m a Jedi?  _ The question was desperate, hungry. There was no Order to answer to, no Code to repeat. It was all gone.

_ Well, what  _ is _ a Jedi? _

The Temple retreated into itself, and Miyala was left alone on the steps. It was night now, with a dozen moons hovering in the sky, and she distinctly remembered the play of the morning sun along the river bed. She brushed layers of snow off her shoulders, and sat down on the steps, irritated. The Jedi were the guardians of the Republic, upholders of peace and justice across the galaxy.

Everyone  _ knew  _ that.

Except.

Miyala hesitated. Something hovered out of reach, and she huffed, her aggravation only growing. Bunching her still damp pants up into a wad, she tucked them under her head, falling asleep.

She woke to the sun, and sat up, cringing as her back complained loudly about sleeping on stone steps. She was 28, but she was a veteran of hard campaigns, and she felt old. What had the war done for anyone anyway? It had put a Sith in power.  _ A Sith. _

She scowled at the cheerful clouds, but the Temple had told her to think, so she pulled her legs into a lotus position and began to meditate.

_ Inhale. _

The Jedi should have been able to stop the Sith.

_ Exhale. _

The Jedi had not sensed him.

_ Inhale. _

The Jedi Shadows had not been able to track the quarry they were supposed to track.

_ Exhale _ .

Miyala had proudly served as a Jedi Shadow, hunting down slavers and crime rings undercover in the Outer Rim.

_ Inhale. _

Miyala had returned to a Temple of slavers.

_ Exhale. _

Again, the Order had been blind to it’s faults.

_ Inhale _ .

The Order had many faults.

_ Exhale _ .

Was the Order the Jedi?

_ Inhale _ .

A Jedi is something one is.

_ Exhale. _

What qualities made a Jedi?

_ Inhale. _

Miyala opened her eyes. She walked from training arena to training arena, pausing in her trek to run her fingers over the medical building in the middle of them. She stood over the hard packed earth, where the Jedi had first trained so many millennia ago.

She returned to the doors, and spoke. “I am a Jedi. I guard when others cannot. I do what others cannot in service of the Republic, of democracy. I hunt the Sith.”

The doors did not open, and she scowled. Miyala unsheathed her lightpikes and spun and twirled. She opened herself to the Force as she lunged at invisible enemies and parried unseen strikes. With each step the Force whispered of a thousand lifetimes and a thousand paths. 

A Sith Lord turned traitor to the Empire, resplendent as she stood among the Council. A Jedi Consular knelt as she was awarded an ancient title. A Sith Warrior brought her Wrath upon the galaxy. A woman managed a small cafe, comfortable, safe. A Senator wrapped herself in gilt and black, sending her voice across the galaxy. A conqueror was reborn, and grew even stronger from her ashes.

She struck, and she danced, and finally, she sheathed her blades. Slowly, she made her way back to the doors. “I protect,” Miyala said, her voice cracking, “I take the blows others cannot. I defend people, and knowledge, and the Force, as much as I can. I am the one who stands at the gate, and says to evil ‘You shall not pass’.” 

She knelt on the steps,and looked up at the doors. “Force help me, but in all those visions, I tried. Whoever I was, in whatever life, I did my best. I’m doing my best now.” A sob crawled out of her throat, and she tried to choke it down as she watched the stone doors remain closed.

Her eyes closed. “I just want to help,” she whispered.

The doors cracked open, swinging out, and Miyala took a few steps backward. Her blue eyes went wide as she was greeted by blue holograms of ancient Masters and bronzium statues and red carpets. The inner Temple had survived. She took a few steps forward, and paused on the threshold. Miyala looked around, and hummed in the Force, adding her presence to the echoes of many others, and took her first steps into the Temple.

A Jedi had returned to Tython.


End file.
